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Veg-free diet (Storm's thread)

Hi all,

So I'm sure some of you know Storm and remember the continuous struggle I've been having with him repeatedly getting early stages of stasis. Well it has now happened about 5/6 times in the past month and I've gotta be honest, I'm getting seriously fed up with it, as I'm sure he is too.

Well, I'm not going to put him up for rescue or palm him off onto someone else because I love the little terror with all my heart and wouldn't do that unless it was better for his well being, but I want to know what you all think about cutting out vegetables. Before I got him he never had stasis and he also never had vegetables but for some reason I never made the link. A week or two after I first got him he developed stasis and since then he has been getting it at least twice a month. However, before last week he hadn't had it in just over 3 weeks, making me think that it possibly isn't vegetables as I was still giving them to him in that time.

My question is, does anyone think I should try either reducing the veg right down to a small piece (for example one tree of broccoli) or cutting it out completely? Also, could I continue feeding him herbs as they are his absolute favourite thing?
 
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A rabbit does not need vegetables or herbs, but of course many rabbits including mine really like them. What else do you feed him (apologies as you have probably stated this before)?

Apart from hay, grass and a few pellets I feed mine forage, tree leaves and branches, vegetables and herbs.

If I were you I would try and do this scientifically i.e. just cut one thing out for a while and see how he is. I think that the most likely cause would be the vegetables so that is what I would cut out completely for a while. During that time I would still feed herbs and anything else he would normally have.
 
I don't feel experienced/confident enough to advise on what you should do I'm afraid but my one of my rabbits gets very little veg. She used to have fairly regular stasis episodes, and her partner had a few, so I started keeping a log on what she'd been fed and it always seemed to be after veg, especially things like broccoli etc. So I just stopped giving them those and reduced the amount of other veg they get and they hadn't had a stasis episode in years since. I still gave herbs as they never had problems with those. I hope you find a solution.
 
Hi, just to add to the others above, we have never given our bunnies regular veg. Instead he might get a carrot top or bit of banana maybe once a month! Otherwise he does have a small handful of fresh herbs and grass alternatively every evening. He has never had Stastis but when he was younger he would do a lot of tummy pressing and that was because he was having veg too often! Then again this was when he was aged 12-16 weeks! Xx
 
Wow thanks everyone, all three comments were super helpful and I'm definitely going to at least reduce the veg by a huge amount, if not stopping it altogether.

Besides pellets (20 daily) and TRYING to feed him hay (he will only eat readigrass, which he also won't eat a huge amount of), I give him herbs, forage/leaves/flowers that I buy online, a couple of carrotys/1 fenugreek crunchie (treats) and usually a portion of recovery food daily. He also gets a small amount of fruit once a week and this is usually watermelon. Besides broccoli, what other vegetables have you all found to be quite problematic? The only ones I really feed are curly kale, spring greens and sprouts, however I occasionally do feed broccoli, cauliflower and cucumber.
 
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Also, does anyone have a link to a specific simethicone that they use? I'm struggling to find one that I know is definitely safe for bunnies.
 
Mine don't have a great deal of veg .. they have the pellets in the morning and a bowl of kale in the evening. Sometimes will add carrot and cucumber to the kale. Thats all the veg they get. Very rarely for a treat they may get a slice of apple each. They have been absalutely fine like this alongside unlimted hay.
 
Hi all,

So I'm sure some of you know Storm and remember the continuous struggle I've been having with him repeatedly getting early stages of stasis. Well it has now happened about 5/6 times in the past month and I've gotta be honest, I'm getting seriously fed up with it, as I'm sure he is too.

Well, I'm not going to put him up for rescue or palm him off onto someone else because I love the little terror with all my heart and wouldn't do that unless it was better for his well being, but I want to know what you all think about cutting out vegetables. Before I got him he never had stasis and he also never had vegetables but for some reason I never made the link. A week or two after I first got him he developed stasis and since then he has been getting it at least twice a month. However, before last week he hadn't had it in just over 3 weeks, making me think that it possibly isn't vegetables as I was still giving them to him in that time.

My question is, does anyone think I should try either reducing the veg right down to a small piece (for example one tree of broccoli) or cutting it out completely? Also, could I continue feeding him herbs as they are his absolute favourite thing?

Forage is good for rabbits who cannot easily tolerate fresh supermarket vegetables. Are his teeth OK? (sorry, I can't remember from previous posts).

If you can, intersperse readigrass with other hays and fresh grass. Readigrass can be quite rich for some rabbits' tummies, though I've never had a problem with free feeding it to any of mine.
 
Have you tried him with fresh grass? Admittedly mine all eat loads of hay, but they much prefer fresh grass. Also. if you get to know what forage and leaves rabbits can have, it is so easy to go outside and collect them (more available later in the year obviously). Blackberry leaves are extremely good for digestion and rabbits usually like them a lot.

Why do you give him recovery food? He might not feel he needs to eat hay if he fills up with other food.

I am a lot meaner than you and my rabbits only get one fenugreek crunchie each perhaps every 7-10 ten days :). I have never fed fruit of any type.
 
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Mine don't have a great deal of veg .. they have the pellets in the morning and a bowl of kale in the evening. Sometimes will add carrot and cucumber to the kale. Thats all the veg they get. Very rarely for a treat they may get a slice of apple each. They have been absalutely fine like this alongside unlimted hay.
He gets the same sort of thing as this, including the unlimited hay, but he just won't eat it [emoji20] Roughly how much kale would you say that you give yours daily?
 
In regards to Kale, I can't really comment as I don't tend to feed it to my bun. However previous times at my vets, I know they have never feed any more than 5-6 pieces daily but I have recently only had mini lops. So don't know if this helps?

Also I hope you don't mind me saying but I honestly can't remember why but I'm sure I have heard something before about cauliflower not being very good for bunnies. But I'm sure others will be able to advise better.
 
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He gets the same sort of thing as this, including the unlimited hay, but he just won't eat it [emoji20] Roughly how much kale would you say that you give yours daily?

Why doesn't he eat hay? That's why I asked about his teeth ...

Kale is quite high in calcium and I tend not to feed it every day :)
 
Forage is good for rabbits who cannot easily tolerate fresh supermarket vegetables. Are his teeth OK? (sorry, I can't remember from previous posts).

If you can, intersperse readigrass with other hays and fresh grass. Readigrass can be quite rich for some rabbits' tummies, though I've never had a problem with free feeding it to any of mine.

He needed one dental about 2 months ago due to previous neglect, but this didn't really seem to help the problem. His teeth are currently slightly uneven but aren't causing any lacerations to his mouth, he also hasn't got any of the tell-tale signs of needing another dental at the moment, though I am always on the lookout as I suspect he will need one soon.

I also do mix the readigrass in other hay but he still picks it out and leaves the hay.
 
Have you tried him with fresh grass? Admittedly mine all eat loads of hay, but they much prefer fresh grass. Also. if you get to know what forage and leaves rabbits can have, it is so easy to go outside and collect them (more available later in the year obviously). Blackberry leaves are extremely good for digestion and rabbits usually like them a lot.

Why do you give him recovery food? He might not feel he needs to eat hay if he fills up with other food.

I am a lot meaner than you and my rabbits only get one fenugreek crunchie each perhaps every 7-10 ten days :). I have never fed fruit of any type.
He will only eat fresh grass if it is straight from the ground and generally won't touch it if I pick it for him. I'm hoping that now it's getting warmer and I will be able to give him supervised outside time that it will get a little better because he will be eating more fresh grass. I do kind of know what forage they can eat however I don't drive and can't really get anywhere to pick any, hence ordering it online instead.

I didn't used to give him recovery food but because he wasn't eating enough hay I had to start giving it to him most days so I knew that he was eating enough and getting a good amount of fibre (though I know it's not as much as he needs to be getting).
 
In regards to Kale, I can't really comment as I don't tend to feed it to my bun. However previous times at my vets, I know they have never feed any more than 5-6 pieces daily but I have recently only had mini lops. So don't know if this helps?

Also I hope you don't mind me saying but I honestly can't remember why but I'm sure I have heard something before about cauliflower not being very good for bunnies. But I'm sure others will be able to advise better.
I don't give him very much kale and they are quite small chopped up bits rather than whole leaves so I can't really say what I give in the equivalent of leaves or anything, but it's roughly a small handful.

Oh really? I'd always read that cauliflower and the leaves are OK to feed rabbits? I would never feed them something that I knew they weren't supposed to eat.
 
I would try lots of different hays, it might actually help with the stasis. I tried all the pet store types of hay, Flo would not eat any of it! She didn't really touch ready grass either. Then I bought a fairly cheap bale of hale from an equine feed supplier (efeed.co.uk) and as soon as I put fresh stuff in both her and Tubsy are in the hay pile chomping away!!
 
I would try lots of different hays, it might actually help with the stasis. I tried all the pet store types of hay, Flo would not eat any of it! She didn't really touch ready grass either. Then I bought a fairly cheap bale of hale from an equine feed supplier (efeed.co.uk) and as soon as I put fresh stuff in both her and Tubsy are in the hay pile chomping away!!
I have tried several different types, but I'm going to have a look at efeed.co.uk to see about trying some hay from there. Did it have a specific name or was it just basically a bale of locally sourced hay?
 
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